Historical Perspective

1930-1966

By 1940, the police department had expanded to 25 men (a roster of 17 regulars and eight supernumeraries). The 17 regulars were:

Chief Gordon, Capt. Schendel, Sgt. John J. McGlinn, Lt. Barron, Sgt. Michael F. Fitzgerald, Raymond F. Griffin, David F. Galligan, Herman A. Muske, Harold V. Heffron, Lester E. Behrend, John L. Cavagnaro, Arthur P. Seymour, Lucius A. Thrall, Rudolph Wirtalla, Walter R. Cassells Sr., Joseph A. Prentice, and Winfield. R. Martin.

The 1940 gross budget was $48, 235, with the chief's salary being $3,372 and captain's pay being $2,618. During that year, there were 1,370 messages sent via radio to police cars; 309 auto accidents were investigated; the department's motorcycles covered 7,543 miles and three cruisers covered 148,521 miles during patrol and case operations, plus special traveling such as parades and funerals; 842 complaints were investigated and 324 street lights were reported burned out and had to be replaced.

It was in 1940, that the Manchester Police commissioners authorized the purchase and installation of a modern two-way short wave radio system. This system enabled the police station desk at the Hall of Records to maintain contact with the three radio-equipped cruisers operated by the town. Prior to this system, the cruisers had radios which resembled telephones and were very poor receivers. Before transmitting, a button had to be pushed which would allow the radio to warm up.

In 1947, the Town of Manchester adopted the council-manager form of government. This change marked the end of the Board of Police commissioners, which was dissolved. The last commissioners to serve on the board were Joseph G. Pero, Jay E. Rand, and William P. Quish.

In 1947, Chief Gordon retired after 39 years of service. Police Captain Herman O. Schendel took the oath of office as police chief on November 22, 1947, and assumed command of 20 regular officers and 15 supernumeraries, and a budget of $77,390.

Schendel was a 20-year veteran of the department. He had served as a supernumerary in 1914, and had become a regular in 1915. He resigned in 1918, and was reappointed in 1920, at which time he was made a captain.

Under Chief Schendel, a probationary patrolman was required to work, for their first year, 365 consecutive days, with no days off. Regular officers worked a six-day week. Probationary patrolmen received the same weekly pay for their seven-day work week as the regulars received for their six-day week. Both veteran and probationary officers were required to work double shifts. Under Chief Schendel, if an officer was involved in an accident with a cruiser, the officer was made to pay for the damage. Schendel instituted many innovations to the department: 24-hour-a-day patrols, a new system of police record-keeping, a rigid police training program, canine units, and the use of new equipment, including radar systems for highway patrols.

The police department had taken over the entire Hall of Records building in 1930, when the town clerk and probate moved into the Municipal Building at 41 Center Street. In November 1953, architect Arnold Lawrence was hired by the town to prepare plans and specifications for remodeling the town's old Almshouse, on East Middle Turnpike, into a new police station.

The Almshouse, better known as the Town Farm, was a town-operated home for the poor and elderly, which had been in operation for 50 years when it closed in 1953. The 40-room, T-shaped, two story wood and brick structure was in a sad state of repair, and a contractor estimated it would cost $150,000 to remodel the building. Schendel remodeled the building at a cost of $75,000 with the help of a crew of volunteers, including off-duty auxiliary police and regular officers, and by haggling for materials.

The police headquarters was moved from the Hall of Records into its new location, at 239 East Middle Turnpike, in 1954. The renovated building included eight cells, a shooting range, an up-to-date service garage for police department vehicles, and a court room and offices for the Circuit Court.
From 1958 to 1959, under Chief Schendel, the department had eight trained dogs. These German shepherds were assigned to men on a voluntary basis, and were personally raised and trained by Chief Schendel, who was a professional dog trainer and author of many books on the subject.

In September of 1958, Chief Schendel retired from active duty. An open competitive examination was conducted to fill the position of chief, which meant that, for the first time, a chief could be selected from the ranks of any police department. James M. Reardon, a Manchester native and State Police lieutenant, was chosen from 16 applicants and was sworn in as the fourth Manchester police chief on January 5, 1959.

Reardon was born and raised in Manchester and had worked at the Cheney Brothers mill before joining the State Police Department in 1936. He was attached to the Groton Troop until 1942, when a citation for his work in cracking an arson case, involving $5 million worth of fires in Southern New England, led to his transfer to the Hartford Troop. He was assigned to the Fire Marshal's Division, and rose to the rank of lieutenant by 1958.

Chief Reardon, with a starting salary of $7,982, assumed command of a force of 40 men, eight cruisers, one motorcycle, and one emergency truck. Reardon marked himself, from the onset of his command, as a progressive-minded individual who made many changes in the department.

One of the first major changes Chief Reardon made was to distinctively mark the police cruisers with white doors and a red light mounted on the roof. He also removed the last motorcycle from the road in 1960. Other innovations during his first years as chief were the dropping of the north end walking beat, the addition of five new patrolmen, the purchase of the department's first walkie-talkie radios, and a contract to have the cruisers washed each day.

In 1959, Reardon informally organized a detective bureau. he placed veteran Sergeant Joseph Sartor in charge of the newly-formed investigating unit, which was staffed by officers assigned on a 30-day rotating basis, until September 1959, when Officer Thomas Graham was promoted to the rank of detective. In 1965, the Detective Division was formally established with Joseph Sartor, as a lieutenant, in charge.

By 1961, the department's budget had risen to $399,900 and chief Reardon had added six new men and a new cruiser. Those figures rose to $438,000 with 47 officers, 10 cruisers, and two trucks for 1963. In 1964, Reardon eliminated the seven-day week workload, and implemented a 6/2 schedule in which the officer worked a 40-hour week with seven-week shifts.

Reardon had a new records system implemented in 1961. The system originated from a survey made by the Committee on uniform Crime Records of the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP). It included a consolidated daily report of police activities and a statistical record of criminal and motor vehicle cases. It also provided for a running account and record of all police work.

The department had one of the best police department photo laboratories and dark rooms in the state at this time. more than a dozen men on the police force were qualified photographers, and accident and crime scene photographs were developed in-house.

in 1966, Mr. Edwin Hyjek designed a new seal for the Town of Manchester. This seal design, a maroon mulberry tree on a yellow/orange background, was the pattern for the department's shoulder patch, which replaced the original (1957) Manchester patch, which had been based on a generic patch used by many departments in the state. The patch was blue and gray with the Connecticut State Seal in the center and the words "Manchester Police Conn," above and below. The auxiliary patch was powder blue.

Reardon was a proponent of women in policing and created the position of policewoman in 1966. Patricia Graves, who had been a store detective at G. Fox and Co. in Hartford, was hired as the first policewoman on the force on May 5, 1966. Policewoman Graves was assigned to the detective division and handled all cases involving women, sex crimes, and juveniles.